5 Best Stories You Might Have Missed This Week

5 Best Stories You Might Have Missed This Week

Posted by Laura Heaton on March 12, 2010

Here at Enough, we often swap emails with interesting articles and feature stories that we come across in our favorite publications and on our favorite websites. We wanted to share some of these stories with you as part of our effort to keep you up to date on what you need to know in the world of anti-genocide and crimes against humanity work.

The International Rescue Committee created this short and catchy video to urge people to sign a petition calling on Congress to pass the International Violence Against Women Act. It’s very shareable, so pass it around in honor of International Women’s Day/Month.

Reporting from the Liberian capital of Monrovia, Doreen Carvajal of the New York Times highlighted the U.N. peacekeeping mission’s innovative approach to nation building in a post-conflict setting. At 14 percent, women peacekeepers in the Liberia mission represent the largest proportion of women in missions worldwide. Professor Gerard DeGroot, who has done extensive research on the influence of women in the military, explained the rationale:

“When female soldiers are present, the situation is closer to real life, and as a result the men tend to behave. Any conflict where you have an all-male army, it’s like a holiday from reality. If you inject women into that situation, they do have a civilizing effect.”

This State Department apology, covered by Foreign Policy, to the Libyan president is pretty funny. Mr. Crowley, we knew what you meant, but now that you mention it, your assessment of President Qaddafi’s performance at the U.N. General Assembly wasn’t so diplomatic.

Geoffrey York of the Globe and Mail blog Africa Diary offers an interesting discussion of the recent grenade attacks in Kigali, Rwanda through an interview with journalist Didas Gasana of the embattled weekly Umuseso. York describes one theory of the journalist:

Although he cannot prove it, [Gasana] believes there is a possibility that the grenade attacks were orchestrated by state intelligence agencies to justify a crackdown on electoral politics. It’s an uncomfortable question, but without the independent media in Rwanda there would be nobody to raise such questions.

Colum Lynch’s second edition of his new daily round-up over at Foreign Policy’s U.N. blog highlights a number of stories relevant to Enough, including coverage of the U.N.’s commemoration of International Women’s Day, Special Envoy Gration’s (distressing) suggestion that parties need to hustle through the Darfur peace process before full-time focus must be dedicated to Sudan’s elections, and a real zinger about my boss from the outgoing Sudanese ambassador to the U.N.